Page 23 of The Demigod

And possibly save mankind.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Daemon

I damn sure wasn’t going to tell sweet shadow girl about the shit that had happened to me while I’d been in that basement.

About the lashes, the punches, the scratching and stabbing.

Worse yet, though, the mental doom that filled me, sucking out anything akin to joy or hope.

It was like shadows filled my mind, blanketing any light in darkness, making me sure that all I would ever know again was pain and emptiness.

But it was the darkness itself that, somehow, saved me.

Darkness conjured images of shadows. Then, out of those shadows, my little shadow girl. And all of her warmth, her goodness, her selflessness. And, yeah, all that pretty didn’t hurt either.

In my emptiness, I reached for her, that little voice whispering in the back of my mind.

Mine.

And, just for the duration of the torture, I went ahead and let myself believe that.

It got me through.

The doom teased around the corners of that fantasy, but couldn’t penetrate, couldn’t overtake me.

Then it was over.

And there she was.

Stepping out of her shadow.

Shedding a tear for the state of me.

Mineminemine.

It was a good thing, I guessed, that we were to spend the night away from each other. It would give me time to separate the fantasy that had helped me get through the torture with my mind intact and the woman herself.

One who didn’t want me.

She was laser-focused on her mission.

Finding her sister.

Saving mankind.

Or, at least, as much of it as she could.

I couldn’t crush her spirit, tell her that this was bigger than her siblings, that there were clearly other gods to contend with. This was the one thing she felt like she could control. And, who knew, maybe Nemesis would bring some balance back to things.

So I mustered some motivation and started to tear through the woods, checking every rock formation, abandoned building, and cave I came across.

But there was nothing.

There wasn’t even a hint of power around. Though, to be fair, if Nemesis was around and bound by some sort of spell, there was a chance there would be no noticeable trace of her.

I checked Nox’s watch several times. She’d been right about my concept of time. When you lived forever, whole weeks or months could pass and feel like just days. Hours, in particular, were harder for me to keep track of.

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